Winter wasn’t as cold as you think — seriously

TORONTO – It’s the end of April and across most of Canada, temperatures are still below normal. Naturally, you might think that Earth is under a bit of a chill, but the truth is, it’s been warmer than normal globally.

READ MORE: Weather challenge–Who had the worst winter in Canada?

According to the National Climatic Data Center (NCDC), an arm of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the combined average temperature over global land and ocean surfaces in January was the warmest since 2007 and the fourth warmest on record at 12.7 C — 0.65 C above the 20th century average. Even if you removed the ocean temperature, the global land temperature was the highest since 2007 and the fourth highest for January at 1.17 C above the 20th century average of 2.8 C.

It may seem hard to believe as Canadians were dealing with the persistent polar vortex that brought record low temperatures across the country and in the United States.

It was still warmer in February and March, but not as much.

The combined average global land and ocean surface temperature tied with 2001 as the 21st highest at 0.41 C above the 20th century average; March saw a jump in global temperature — the fourth highest for March on record at 0.71 C above the 20th century average.

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So what if we took out the record cold temperatures in the U.S. and Canada?

“It was cold over the U.S. and Canada, and in February it was also cold over central Eurasia, central Asia, northern Siberia,” Jessica Blunden, climatologist with the NCDC told Global News.

“In March, it was almost exactly the same, except that central Asia, where it was cooler than average before, switched over to warmer-than-average. So then we were the fourth warmest on a global scale,” Blunden said.

If the record cold hadn’t persisted over North America, that temperature increase would have jumped even higher.

Some of the warmest places around the globe were in Eurasia and northern Europe. In March, parts of Europe experienced the top five warmest month in years. Australia was also warmer than average, though not reaching record warmth.

“The cold has stayed over the U.S. and Canada, starting back in December, but really the rest of the world…mostly they’ve had anomolous or warmer-than-average temperatures,” Blunden said.

And those warmer temperatures are expected to continue for months to come — but not necessarily in the U.S. and Canada.

“We are the anomaly,” Blunden said.